Category Archives: bible

Tomorrow morning if you’re up early you should be able to catch me speaking on local radio stations around the UK. I will be talking about children in care over the Christmas break and what we should be doing to help.

As you may know we have started a new charity called “Home for Good” to help inspire the church to action on behalf of vulnerable children through finding more foster carers and adopters and for the church to become the champion and support for those that do step forward to help.

Our charity is very small and so if you wanted a good cause to give to this Christmas season I’d humbly suggest you give to us. We promise the money you give us will help us change the lives of vulnerable children through finding them the homes they need. Regular gifts are particularly helpful to us, but anything you can give makes a big difference. Click here to give.

Possibly the most anticipated movie of the decade is due to arrive in cinemas on December 18th 2015. Today the world was given an 88 second glimpse of the opening of the 7th chapter of the Star Wars story with the global release of the teaser trailer for Star Wars “The Force Awakens.”

1. There’s been an awakening.

The first scene of the trailer shows a terrified storm trooper on a desert planet. We are told in a spine tingling voice over “There has been an awakening” that apparently we all should have felt. This is a new phase in the story of the Force but I must admit I have always struggled to understand the Force. In Episode 1 we were told by Qui Gon Jin about the strange connection between microscopic life forms and one’s ability to discern the force’s will:

“Without the midi-chlorians, life could not exist, and we would have no knowledge of the Force. They continually speak to us, telling us the will of the Force. When you learn to quiet your mind, you’ll hear them speaking to you.”Qui-Gon Jinn, to Anakin Skywalker

There’s been an ongoing problem in my mind with understanding the force because the force is described in both personal and impersonal terms. Obi Wan calls it an energy field but Qui Jon describes it anthropomorphically attributing to the force “a will.”

“Well, the Force is what gives a Jedi his power. It’s an energy field created by all living things. It surrounds us and penetrates us; it binds the galaxy together.”
Obi-Wan Kenobi

The force has both a good side and a dark side and can seemingly be commanded for completely different purposes at the same time. Eg. Yoda can fight the emperor both using the force at the same time.

To be honest too many people try to use prayer in the same way that the Jedi and the Sith use the force. People often say prayer is powerful. But I know that in war time both sides will often be praying for completely opposite things. So unlike the the force a Christian understanding of prayer puts all the power in God’s hands not in the person praying, nor in prayer itself but in God. Prayer is a means of speaking to God inviting him into a situation that his will is done. We pray asking not that some impersonal force is wielded by us, but rather we ask that God our heavenly father intervenes in our situation and we place ourselves at his disposal.

2. Robots Rock… and Roll

The second scene of the trailer shows an R2-D2 like robot rolling across another desert landscape. It’s a novel design that looks like James Dyson has been asked to redesign an astro-mech droid and he has riffed on his ball vacuum cleaner theme. The droids are the only characters to survive all the way through the Star Wars films and like all good Science Fiction movies raise exciting questions about the possibilities artificial intelligence can bring. R2 D2 has been a conundrum for me as he (?) clearly is sentient – taking initiative to rescue Anakin and Luke, celebrating and even arguing with C3P0 on many occasions. Whoever designed him had the sophistication to give him sentience and yet not able to give him the ability to speak. So we get the skippy the kangaroo problem trying to communicate with him – only C3PO and Luke seem to be able to understand what he is saying.

For me I guess we sometimes underestimate the power and complexity of speech. For Christians thinking about the fact that central to our belief is a speaking God. We must be careful not to treat God like Skippy the bush kangaroo and pretend we know what he is saying and really just load on to him whatever we want him to be saying.

3. The Empire is not over

The third scene shows sleeker and cooler looking Storm Troopers but Storm Troopers none the less. Despite the overthrow of the emperor and his fleet after a ferocious Ewok attack ( I am personally rejoicing that there is no sign of the annoying fuzz balls in this film ); the Empire lingers.

Star Wars has always tapped into the classic good versus evil epic storyline. It nuanced it with characters moving to and from both sides and had at its heart a strong redemptive narrative with Annakin travelling to the darkside and then back again thanks to the unwavering love of his son back to the light. Although episode 6 ended with a victory there is still a fight on.

Christianity has always posited a good verses evil perspective to human existence. Like Star Wars redemption has always been part of that story with God’s looking to redeem a fallen and broken world. Christianity also sees redemption made possible by the unflinching love of a son. But this time the son was not saving the Father but instead working with the Father to save creation.

4. Women are heroic

Right from the original episode IV women have not been treated as damsels in distress in need of rescuing. From Princess Lea to Padme there have been strong women at the heart of the Star Wars narrative. With the fourth scene in this teaser trailer we see a young woman gunning her land speeder and jetting off into the distance.

I have read too many Christian books arguing that men are to be the heroes and women like to be rescued. Sadly this is not bourn out neither in the Star Wars Universe nor in the Bible. What do you do about heroines such as Deborah, Ruth, Jael or Esther with such a strange understanding of gender roles.

5. The past will be honoured

The barrel rolling Millennium Falcon complete with the JJ Abrams trade mark lens flare is a good sign that Abrams is going to honour the past Star Wars canon. He shows a reverence for what went before and yet looks set to innovate.

Theologians for a long time have been talking about the way in which the church plays out biblical truth by both honouring the canon of scripture and extemporizing in a reverent way its performance in the world today.

Dear friends, I am doing a number of international speaking trips in the next few months. Whenever I am travelling I am always keen to make connections with people who have a passion for working with vulnerable children. Last month I had a very helpful meeting in Cape Town with a whole bunch of people from a range of churches and agencies including Message Trust South Africa, Arise Ministries, Hill Songs and Jubilee church. We met to explore what might be done to engage the church with the the huge fostering and adoption needs across the city. I shared a bit of the Home for Good story not that we might have a franchise in another country but just to see if it might spark a local movement that is appropriate for the South African context. We had a great conversation and I ask for your prayers as a fledgling network develops in Cape Town. Next month I am travelling in Australia with the National Youth Ministry Convention. I am going to be in Brisbane (6th of November) , Perth (8th of November and Melbourne (10th of November). I will helping to equip youth leaders and workers in equipping young people for Anti-fragile faith by drawing on my book Paradoxology. If you know anyone that would be helped by this do encourage them to book in.

The generous people at NYMC have pulled together a couple of meet ups form in Melbourne. The first is with theological educators on the Novmber 10th I’ll be sharing a bit about London School of Theology and exploring partnership opportunities as well as picking the brains of my Australian friends on how they see the future of theological education.

In Melbourne and a special lunch to meet ministry leaders with a passion for working with vulnerable children and so we’ll be sharing the Home for Good story and again learning from those that come insights that will help our UK team in our work to find vulnerable children adoptive and foster families.

If you can think of anyone that would like to come to that ( spaces are limited as there is food involved )please drop me an email or Facebook or Twitter message or post a comment below.

Finally on the way home I have some time in Singapore and will be doing some work with OMF there then meeting up with the Home for Good Singapore network. Again if you know someone that should be invited to our gathering let me know. Here are the details.

What a Summer it has been. I have just come back from Momentum a massive conference for 20 somethings that takes place in Shepton Mallet . Its the last of the events in the New Wine & Soul Survivor family of conferences on the site this season.

Packed in for an exposition from Ephesians at LPO.

It will have been one of the last major events that I speak at as an Evangelical Alliance Director as I have just taken on two new jobs. It gave me opportunity to reflect a little on the transition. As I have had the honour of working for the Evangelical Alliance these last 7 years I have travelled the length and breadth of the UK and met so many people hungry to go deeper in their relationship with God, eager to relate their faith to their professional work and life and passionate to serve God in their communities and churches. When the opportunity to become the President of London School of Theology came up it seemed a natural next step to try and respond to that hunger so many people are feeling for depth in their relationship with God.

Powerful talk from Katherine Welby-Roberts about God and Mental Health

Theological education is an opportunity to think hard and deep about God’s word so that we might know God better. I have been writing and speaking a lot recently about the need to push beyond the simplistic answers and so it has been exciting to see packed out seminars at Keswick and Momentum this summer with people young and old wanting to invest time to beef up their theology. Hundreds had to be turned away at both festivals this summer as we literally could fit everyone in the venues as we did some serious theology together. There was always a queue of people wanting to discuss rich theological questions afterwards whether it was about how to interpret scripture, how to answer friends’ difficult questions or how to reconcile difficult theological concepts together. I also spent a week teaching at Le Pas Opton in France and decided to try and stretch guests there by taking a look at theology, technology and the book of Ephesians and tackling the book of Esther in the evenings. I was so encouraged to find all ages hungry for more of God’s word.

The hunger is there – maybe its in you too?

Great chat about space, time, free will on the paradoxology sofa

So I would like to invite you to come and study with us at LST.

It’s not too late and we have a range of very exciting programmes. Let me just mention two to start with:

Why not make your first degree one in theology, its not too late to get into the programme this year if you act quickly. come and study at the largest theological college in Europe with a great faculty and students from all around the world.

I love this programme. This is theology for the digital age – as academically credible as possible but now more accessible than ever before. Study completely online or mix it up and spend time with us at college. Choose from seven exciting specialisations: Social Justice, Christian Worship Studies, Old Testament, New testament, Systematics and Public Leadership to get an MA in theology that will do you good and equip you to do some good in the world. The MA is flexible enough to allow you to study full or part time anywhere in the world.

As a young Christian, I became convinced of a complementarian position when it came to women in leadership. In any argument 1 Timothy 2:11-12 was my trump card. It was so clear that anyone who disagreed was clearly denying the authority of scripture and was driven by a culture-pleasing and ultimately liberal agenda. Though I respect my many friends who hold a complementarian position due to their reading of scripture and their conscience I have changed my mind. I am not alone in this change: Howard Marshall, Chris Wright, John Ortberg, Ron Sider and Bill Hybels have made the same journey. In such a short article it’s not possible to solve all the controversies surrounding this passage, so I’ll merely ask some framing questions to help us navigate the pitfalls this verse creates.

Here’s the passage in question:

2 I urge, then, first of all, that petitions, prayers, intercession and thanksgiving be made for all people—2 for kings and all those in authority, that we may live peaceful and quiet lives in all godliness and holiness.3 This is good, and pleases God our Savior,4 who wants all people to be saved and to come to a knowledge of the truth.5 For there is one God and one mediator between God and mankind, the man Christ Jesus,6 who gave himself as a ransom for all people. This has now been witnessed to at the proper time.7 And for this purpose I was appointed a herald and an apostle—I am telling the truth, I am not lying—and a true and faithful teacher of the Gentiles.

8 Therefore I want the men everywhere to pray, lifting up holy hands without anger or disputing.9 I also want the women to dress modestly, with decency and propriety, adorning themselves, not with elaborate hairstyles or gold or pearls or expensive clothes,10 but with good deeds, appropriate for women who profess to worship God.

11 A woman should learn in quietness and full submission.12 I do not permit a woman to teach or to assume authority over a man; she must be quiet.13 For Adam was formed first, then Eve.14 And Adam was not the one deceived; it was the woman who was deceived and became a sinner.15 But women[c] will be saved through childbearing—if they continue in faith, love and holiness with propriety.

Edit 1 Timothy 2:11-12 out of scripture, dismissing Paul as sexist

All scripture is God-breathed. That means it carries the weight and authority of God behind it. Some of my complementarian heroes accuse egalitarians of not taking scripture seriously. To be honest they have a point: but only about some egalitarians. I have heard many times that we can ignore Paul because he was obviously a misogynist. I have also heard people argue that we can ignore Paul and prioritise Jesus. But this is not an option for an evangelical egalitarian because of our doctrine of scripture. The scriptures are not a random collection of the thoughts and suggestions of certain ancient people as to how one might like to do church. No, we believe that scripture is breathed out by God which means that when we ignore scripture we are ignoring God. Paul is not speaking his own views or opinions – he is being used by God to communicate His word to God’s church.

Use 1 Timothy 2:11-12 as a lens through which to interpret every discussion of women in leadership

J.I. Packer argues clearly that “scripture must interpret scripture; the scope and significance of one passage is to be brought out by relating it to others”[1].

We don’t try and interpret a Bible text in isolation – we need to allow the rest of scripture to inform and temper the limits of the interpretation of a text. For example: Paul talks about the baptism for the dead in 1 Corinthians 15:29– it would be wrong to build a theology of posthumous salvation from this verse when the scriptures are silent on this issue. Of course, holding the whole of scripture in our minds when we interpret any one part is difficult to do.

3. We ignore the context of 1 Timothy 2:11-12 in the letter itself

This verse is more complex to interpret than immediately meets the eye.

i) No one believes that a woman’s salvation is guaranteed through physical childbirth – the climax of the argument in v.15.

ii) I have yet to visit a church that consistently applied the prohibition of gold jewellery for women (v.9), the lifting up of hands for men in prayer (v.8) and the restriction of women from leadership roles (v.12). There are clearly time bound contextual elements in this passage that do not apply across all times and all cultures and universalising one without the others is very selective.

iii) An argument back to creation is not a deal-closer. There are two problems with arguing the mention of Adam and Eve means this is a creation ordinance. First, Paul argues from creation that women should cover their heads in worship and that men should uncover their heads in worship (in 1 Corinthians 11:7-9), but most interpreters understand the specific issue of head coverings is culturally and time bound and so does not apply today. Second, Paul’s argument is also from the Fall – it is at the Fall that Eve was deceived and “became a sinner” and the events of the Fall are being undone by the redeeming work of Christ. Also when it comes to the Fall the rest of Paul’s reflections do not pick out Eve as more culpable than Adam. (see Romans 5:14).

Finally, the specific challenges Paul addresses in the letter cannot be ignored.

As Scholer argues: “1 Timothy should be understood as an occasional ad hoc letter directed specifically towards enabling Timothy and the church to avoid and combat the false teachers and teaching in Ephesus.”

Paul’s prohibition of women in leadership in 1 Timothy was due to the specific challenges Timothy faced in Ephesus. For me this makes sense of the ministry that Paul encourages in women such as Junia, Euodia, Syntche and Priscilla. I remain convinced that those women that God has called and gifted for leadership roles within the church should be encouraged and empowered to use these gifts to the glory of God.

I know it’s a little ironic, but I have been asked to lead a seminar about women in leadership. Full disclosure, I am not and never have been a woman.

I have decided to take the opportunity and to look for ways that women’s voices can be heard in the seminar. I am also hoping to co-chair the seminar with a woman. I decided to do the seminar because I believe in the conference that asked me to speak – they have a brilliant heart and a wonderful vision and also because I believe passionately that we need to empower women to lead at every level.

I didn’t always believe this; as a teenager a proofext from 1 Tim 2.11 was all I needed to close down the debate. I have learnt a lot about biblical hermeneutics and reading scripture in its canonical and cultural context since then. So I am leading this seminar from the perspective of someone who is absolutely committed to the infallibility of scripture and to women in leadership in the church.

I really want to include as many women’s voices in my seminar as possible and so I would love your help. I have had some terrific responses when I asked the question on twitter.

Dear female friends, what’s the best piece advice you have for women called as leaders in the church?

I found the responses very moving and challenging (see below to read all of them) . Here are my reflections on the tweets I’d love to know your views – I am of course open to suggestion and correction.

Three things I have learned so far…

1. Leadership Humility

I was struck by the gracious and humble tone of the advice. So many of the contributors encouraged patience and kindness towards those who opposed or rejected women’s leadership. I wish I could see more of this evidenced from people on both sides of the debate when they write about this subject – perhaps it is there but I have been reading the wrong stuff. Wherever we stand on this debate we need to approach this subject with grace and humility. We are family together and scripture calls us to be exemplary in the way we handle disputes and debates among us. For those of us that oppose women in leadership we need to recognise that the tone and language used to express your views can crush someone who is trying to follow God’s call on their lives to use their gifts. Leadership is often lonely and isolating and attacking someone’s honest and faithful response to God’s call is a dangerous thing to do. This is not just a theological issue : someone’s call to leadership is linked directly to their sense of identity. Similarly for those of us who support women in leadership we need to recognise that for those that don’t agree with us – this is often a question of conscience for those who oppose us. It is a dangerous thing to ask another Christian to act against their conscience and we act carefully as we seek to persuade someone to change their minds. I was moved by the maturity and generosity of those who offered comment on my twitter question as they encouraged other women to be patient and gracious with those that stood against them.

2. Leadership Integrity

@krishk@rachelheldevans Be patient with those who have a hard time wrapping their heads around your call Growth takes time Stay true 2 you — Lisa Moss Degrenia (@revlisad) July 31, 2014

I found this tweet and many of the others like it very enlightening. There were a lot of calls to be authentic, to be true to whom God has made you to be. I found these words encouraging as it is vital for all leaders to understand the right balance between knowing whom God has made us to be and how we live into that calling with the ongoing challenge of resisting the sin in our lives.

Too often we overemphasise sin to the exclusion of our God given identity or we overemphasise our identity to the exclusion of the sin in our lives. Now some people will say we should find our identity in Christ and not in the role we have received from him and I do understand that. But the New Testament knows about the intertwining of call and identity – Paul writes:

” For when I preach the gospel, I cannot boast, since I am compelled to preach. Woe to me if I do not preach the gospel!”

1 Corinthians 9:16ff

I was moved by so many of the tweets that emphasised the need to be true to yourself in light of the opposition that so many women have faced to taking on leadership roles. It seems that many for many women leaders their identity has been challenged or dare I say oppressed by those that stood against their sense of call as leaders. I remember as a twenty something having a strong sense of call on my life to be an evangelist and a leader in my church telling me I should leave it aside and become a school teacher. I found it crushing that call on my life was being doubted how much worse it must feel to have large groups of the church oppose so vehemently so many womens’ sense of call on their lives to lead.

@krishk Be released from others expectations of you – all you can do is all you can do, and all you can do is enough. — Heather Pocock (@heather_pocock) July 31, 2014

3. Leadership and Accountability

There were a lot of tweets that emphasised the need for support and accountability. For me that is where groups like Sophia Network have been so helpful . I loved the tone of Rachel’s comment:

I know that when I have felt isolated and criticised I have sometimes responded by stopping listening to anyone’s advice or critique and to assume that I am always right – to become self-righteous. Rachel’s tweet is rich with wisdom encouraging us to find genuine friends both male and female to speak truth into our lives. Rachel; who has been a family friend since I was a teenager, is a terrific leader and models the humility this tweet suggests.

It is not every day you get to meet someone who has helped to start a genuine movement of change and restoration. So you can imagine my excitement when it came to spending time with David and Mary Pytches – the couple who helped to birth both New Wine and Soul Survivor.

David and Mary returned to the UK with four young daughters after serving as cross cultural missionaries in Chile. Unsure what God wanted them to do they looked for a base in Chorleywood, which offered education facilities for the girls. David was hoping to learn how to run a parish from the Vicar, but the Vicar was about to leave and David was offered the incumbency. David speaks about his sense of inadequacy and eventually set up a daily early morning prayer meeting. From this time saw an increasing number of people added to the church. Mary recounts how they faithfully retained the liturgy at the same time as being open to the Holy Spirit.

Learning that John Wimber was coming to York David suggested that he call in on Chorleywood on the way. It was an unforgettable weekend. Despite very different ecclesiologicol backgrounds John and David hit it off and became close friends. And soon David was helping John to find organisers for the UK conferences.

I enjoyed being able to tell David how grafeful I was for the Brighton Conference in 1986, where a friend of mine came to faith. He later stood up in our class at our rough and ready comprehensive school and shared his new found faith in Jesus. This was Steven Whittington – a key influence in my becoming a Christian. It was great to learn about a young youth worker from a Baptist church where had run an open youth club, until the local teenagers rampaged the church. The youth worker was Mike Pillavachi, who later became the youth worker at Chorleywood.

David and I had this opportunity to meet after he had read my book “Paradoxology” – Why Christianity was never meant to be simple. David explained to me that it was the title that grabbed him as he had reflected for many years on the paradoxes of scripture which we tend to brush under the carpet, which means our Bible teaching has no real integrity. David reminded me of Charles Simeon, a great evangelical clergyman and bible teacher who had said

“The truth is not in the middle, and not in one extreme; but in both extremes.”

Mary commented on how we tend to cut God down to our size but ‘wouldn’t we rather have a big God’. Interestingly we talked a lot about the liturgy undergirding our spirituality and both Paradox and Liturgy are things that James K.A. Smith has been arguing for recently. Sadly many churches seem to opt either for intimacy with God or depth of teaching when there doesn’t need to be a choice. Depth of true teaching should help us develop intimacy with God and our intimacy with God should drive us towards deeper teaching – it should be a virtuous circle.

David has kindly written a commendation for the reprint of ‘Paradoxology’ which is out soon. It has some typos and corrections added thanks to those of you who spotted my errors. The book will be even better because of you. David says: “I have been looking for a book like this for the last fifty years and am so delighted to have found it.”

I came away from David and Mary greatly encouraged. They are rare people who have experienced so much of God and done so much in His name, and in their seniority are still keen to bless others.

Fathers Day is a great marketing opportunity for pen knife manufacturers , greeting card producers and mens hosiery. It’s not an age old festival having only been created in the 20th century to complement Mother’s Day but I want to make a plea that we need to make the most of it .

I know it can be a sensitive time for people who have grown up without a Dad or even worse with an abusive father. I know it can be difficult for single people and childless couples who may be mourning the lack of opportunity to be a father. But nevertheless I want to make a plea that we make the most of it this weekend. Here are three reasons:

1. God is our Father

Despite their being some terrible father’s in the Bible story God is not ashamed to call himself a Father. The problem comes when we project our experience onto God – for example someone might say – “I had a terrible father so God must be like my dad.” That way of thinking is not a helpful way to approach God – God is not just a projection or an extension of our understanding of things. God is the defining centre. So God sets the example of what true Fatherhood is like, just like Jesus sets the example of what true humanity is like. This Sunday we should take the time to enjoy and celebrate what it means for all of us to know God as our Father and offer everyone the opportunity to get to know him.

2. It’s not too late to become a father

Of course if you are going to talk about the Fatherhood of God that is something that every Christian can claim only because of God’s adoption of us. We have been given the right through Jesus’ life, death and resurrection on our behalf.

“But when the set time had fully come, God sent his Son, born of a woman, born under the law,to redeem those under the law, that we might receive adoption to sonship.”

Galatians 4:4-5

God’s decision to adopt us into his family was driven not by any inner need in the godhead but rather was driven God’s compassion for our plight as vulnerable children (see Galatians 4:3-4). In the same way with so many children waiting in care for adoption – 100 000 children in the USA ; 30 000 in Canada and 6000 in the UK. There are plenty of opportunities for us to become an adoptive or father or at least to offer support to others who are seeking to foster or adopt vulnerable children.

Spike was a Tornado Squadron leader now works as a Airline Pilot and Foster dad.

Love the fact that our little local church is so keen to help all ages experience God together. This morning we continued a series on spiritual growth through looking at a number of spiritual disciplines. This week we used the Labyrinth prayer experience as a church.

All age travel guides

One of the exercises today involved everyone writing down a prayer on some special paper and then heading off into the Labyrinth. Once you got to the middle of the labyrinth there was a font with some water in that you placed your paper prayer into and it dissolved.

Then you were encouraged to write an attribute of God that you appreciated as an act of praise in chalk on the floor.

Then for your journey out of the labyrinth as you go on to face the world you are to take a psalm with you to meditate on.

A Psalm for your journey

All the ages took part today with some of us acting as guides for the travellers.

Well done to the team that put this together!

My 7 year old daughter had a great time, though her prayer did make me laugh…